Others point out that “the alt-right and its fellow travelers were never going to be able to assemble a mass movement... A year after white nationalists in Charlottesville chanted, ‘You will not replace us!,’ their message has been taken up and amplified by Fox News personalities… Laura Ingraham says that ‘the America that we know and love doesn’t exist anymore’ because of ‘massive demographic changes’... as an ideological vanguard, the alt-right fulfilled its own purpose in pulling the Republican Party in its direction.”

The Atlantic

“The alt-right began as an online subculture and will remain one with real staying power, given the salience of far-right ideology among more Americans than we, until very recently, have been willing to admit. A national survey conducted after last year’s Unite the Right rallies suggests that about 10 million Americans believe they ‘mostly agree’ with white supremacists.”

Slate

Perhaps most alarmingly, “there is a large crop of nationalist political candidates who have learned to thrive in the shadows of their much louder ideological kinsmen... Unite the Right II may turn out to be just a very lonely Jason Kessler surrounded by hundreds of counter protestors and journalists, but the movement he represents, the movement that killed Heather Heyer one year ago, is just getting started.”

The Guardian

The right argues the rally is confirmation that the alt-right is a tiny fringe movement and criticizes the mainstream media for making the movement appear more popular than it really is.

“With the help of social media, the lunatic fringe has forced its way into the mainstream media and been made to look larger and more important than it is. The left recognized that the newly visible alt-right could be turned into a political weapon by drawing a straight line between Trump voters and white supremacists, thereby hoping to scare off more mainstream supporters of the current government.”

Wall Street Journal

“The left often treats reasonable conservative positions — held by many if not most Americans —such as opposing illegal immigration and backing voter ID laws as evidence of racist extremism... the notion that the country is boiling over with right-wing lunatics looking to take over our streets and the government is not only untrue, it’s a partisan myth as harmful to democracy as Trump’s ill-advised comments.”